Jones Leadership Academy and Junior Achievement hosted a stock market challenge to teach students portfolio management.
TOLEDO, Ohio — Wall Street came to Toledo on Wednesday.
Students at Jones Leadership Academy in downtown Toledo learned how to make smart investments by venturing into the stock market.
Students were tasked with managing a $1 million portfolio by investing in stocks and watching how they grow over time.
Senior Lathan Fitzpatrick had an edge over the competition.
“I’m not bragging, but we certainly won last year,” Fitzpatrick said.
He stuck to a simple strategy.
“Teamwork. We have to work together,” he said.
Even though the students weren’t investing real money in real stocks, they were taking the competition seriously.
There were four students on the team, each of whom played a different role, including gathering news about companies, watching tickers, and working with investors to find promising stocks.
Each minute of trading counts as one day, for a total of 60 minutes or 60 trading days.
Junior Achievement of Northwest Ohio hosted the event.
“We want to show them the opportunity to invest in themselves over time,” said Julia Simon, marketing and events manager. “We’re not teaching you how to day trade and make a quick buck, what we’re actually teaching you is how to invest in yourself for your future.”
Senior Olivia Jackson was a member of Group 27. She has played the game in years past, but this year her team did their homework.
“Last night, my classmates went researching and learned the division equation to find out how much money you can make in stocks,” Jackson said. “So, last night we had a group chat where we were studying.”
Students say this exercise, rather than a textbook, teaches them concepts they will take with them after graduation.
“This will definitely help me secure enough funds to pursue my dreams,” Fitzpatrick said. “Eventually I plan on getting a bachelor’s degree in science, but I’m going to need all the money to do that. I need to make sure I can reach those goals.”
Senior Jasmine Evans said, “If you learn now, you’ll know how to use your money, how to use it wisely, and you won’t go broke.”
The team with the most money after two rounds of trades took home bragging rights.
“They do a lot of work in class learning how to invest. I think it’s really beneficial to help them put investing into practice and connect classroom learning to real-life applications.” “We can do that,” Simon said.
Video of last year’s event:
